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A richly illustrated guide to the Ottoman Empire, 100 years since its dissolution, unravelling its complex cultural legacy and profound impact on Europe, North Africa and the Middle East. A hundred years after the abolition of the Ottoman Sultanate on 1 November 1922, enough time has surely passed to look again at the Ottomans and reassess their legacy. This book explores their unique achievements in architecture, cuisine, music, science and medicine, as well as the political challenges they met. The Ottoman Empire faced issues shared by modern European and Middle Eastern countries: how to maintain a balance between religious ideology and secular politics and how to promote fairness and equality among citizens in a multicultural society. While many still see in the Ottomans the decadence of Istanbul, harems and hookahs, they are unaware that the secrets of Ottoman success lay in a disciplined bureaucracy and a standing army that both awed and seduced its opponents. They then harnessed the talents of their diverse populations and quickly buttressed the crumbling edifice of Byzantine Christianity. Their dynamism and resilience helped fuse the cultures of Asia, Europe and Africa, from the Himalayas to the Sahara, absorbing whatever impressed them, the best of what they found from Mongol armour to Persian tile work. Alongside their essential rigour and steel, they enjoyed the finer aspects of life, in music, cuisine and art unafraid, even as rugged fighters, to display their love of flowers and gardens, especially the tulip and the rose. Behind the fine robes, carpets and ceramics on display today in their great architectural monuments, Istanbul''s Topkapi Palace and Hagia Sophia, lie centuries of migration, trade and struggle. Diana Darke reveals a radically new picture of the Ottoman Empire in this original and beautifully illustrated book.
